twenty-nine and feeling fine, when i drink wine

Tag Archives: being single

Apologies followers for the time lapse in posts here, I was dealing with two major situations.
1. The situation of realizing I ALSO like women,
2. Mostly that.

I felt it an appropriate time to tell you all, seeing as how it was #NationalComingOutDay and all, and because I have new dating apps to tell you about that have had about as much success as the ones that came before them (so basically I’m still dating my wine glass) and because now that my new sexuality information is floating out around town and getting people all awkward, I ALMOST forgot to open this up for more awkward with you guys!

First things first, you might have questions. Have I always known, how do you define yourself, have you adopted an Ethiopian child with your wife, yada yada.

Well first no, I did not always KNOW. I had suspicions. That I could usually justify.

My common phrase was “I’m just really open” – I could see myself liking someone of the same sex because I’m just such a forward thinker but ask me if I’m gay and I’ll say “Nope” and then kind of sort of want to never talk to you again.

In college I worked with a girl named Lena and quickly realized I couldn’t stop thinking about her. I even told friends I had this little crush on her because I couldn’t keep myself from mentioning her name in any conversation it would allow, and you know I’m just so “open to things” but when asked if I could see myself WITH her (meaning all the sex) I said no I didn’t (I did. I absolutely did. And it was dirty.)

Before Lena, I had actually already had several sexual experiences with different girls when I was in middle school/freshmen in high school. My preteen self decided that those experiences were simply “experimenting” and nothing more, though funny that for something I told myself over and over was “not a big deal” it’s interesting that I never told anyone until now, hmm weird..

Growing up in a VERY christian household made the reality of me facing any of these experiences that much more unrealistic. My focus in middle school really trying to get down the members of Nsync and the Backstreet Boys because I had failed many times trying to pretend I knew who the Spice Girls really were, until being over at a friends house and looking at the poster in her room and saying ohhh okay that’s them, must take mental note that Posh is brunette and Sporty is blonde so I don’t mess this up tomorrow at recess. I mean I knew one of their songs at least, I can sneak my friends cassette player into bed with me just like any other kid. All this to say that trying to navigate any feelings or experiences when I was just trying to get a foothold in non-christian culture was already a lot.

My crush on Lena and and my early “experiments” really started coming to the forefront in the past year. A couple of times I questioned my own signature line, “I’m just a really open person” and was like what does that even fucking mean? Luckily I could always hollow safely back into whatever crush I had on whatever guy at the time and be good.

But as I started to question my signature phrase, I started getting mad. Like really fucking mad.

People who questioned my sexuality were like my new enemies. Poor timing because people just naturally become more curious about your sexual orientation when you’re 26/27 and don’t at least hook up with a guy somewhat regularly.

I got on Eharmony and really began looking to get into a long term relationship with a guy. I needed to be dating and quickly. I wanted to go on more dates to show me how straight I was and to make comments that anyone was making about me irrelevant because I’m with a guy! I’m dating a guy now!

That was the scariest part for me. The part where you know you’re trying to date people to make a point and you KNOW it. You know it’s purposeful, you know it’s to avoid something else, you know it and you can’t un-know it and you need to get into a relationship pronto before this “progresses” like it’s fucking cancer, and basically, YOU KNOW.

When Megan entered my workplace I spent at least three months hating her before I began to think about her romantically, because then it started to become very illogical. If I hate her so much then why do I want to see her? If she’s so awful then why do I wish other people would go away so it can be just us two? If she is the worst like I tell everyone she is, then why do I think about her and I making out in the parking lot after work?

I could sense all the time now that there was something I wasn’t telling people, and I began to shift a small bit of focus on a new line for myself: “I’ll come out whenever the fuck I want to.”

After that I started to become angry if I felt someone pushing me to do anything really. Even though I hadn’t technically told anyone about this at all, it felt like walls were closing in and everyone was trying to warp me, make me say it.

Finally one day at a training for work, talking about resources for marginalized groups of people, my director places me into a group discussing barriers that members of the LGBTQ community face in getting resources. I was so mad I was shaking.

THIS BITCH IS TRYING TO MAKE ME COME OUT

Which of course was entrenching on my new barely formulated phrase of: “I’ll come out whenever the fuck I want to”

So I joined the group to chat about barriers that members of LGBTQ community faced and heard nothing and focused on nothing and was secretly wishing death upon my director when then she comes around to our table, looks to me, and told me that I would be the one presenting what we had discussed.

I’m sure you can imagine the rage. I’ll summarize:

fuckyoufuckyoufuckyoufuckyoufuckyoufuckyoufuckyou

white hot blazing light searing from my eyes

I will literally not present this and you can go to hell

Luckily this all went on in my head and I still have a job. I left the training within four minutes of her telling me I would present. I went to my parents house because they were having a huge birthday party, and my panic was still rising. I said I had a work call to make, got in my car, called my coworker and began to yell. I yelled and yelled until I said “I want to come out whenever I fucking want to come out!!!”

Instantly she got what all this was and she said yes absolutely that is your right. And that was when I began to tell people.

Told my roommate that same night. I had made silent war with him and this coworker I had called earlier because they had been the two making offhanded comments about my sexuality that I had taken as personal attacks/threats, and I had hated them secretly for months, but now they were the people I talked to first.

It’s been so much easier since then. I come out to most people as simply bisexual because it’s easier than explaining what Pansexual is, which is the term I identify with and just fyi I came out as Pans before Miley for the record.

I don’t share this with you guys to get some release, I’ve already been releasing this off of me to people that I love for at least a month now and it’s been wonderful. I took #bivisibilityweek and ran with it!I also don’t share it with you for the joy of receiving uber religious hate mail though I’m sure that will be amusing.

I share this because not only is looking back at how angry I was kind of funny now (especially when you tell your director that you wanted her dead for at least 5 min and she laughs because she put you in that LGBTQ group because the groups were uneven) but I also tell you this in the case that one of you has experienced or is experiencing any small piece of my story.

Whether it’s not knowing who the Spice Girls were either because your parents only let you listen to Amy Grant, or maybe you’ve had experiences like mine and not wanted to ever find the meaning in them, or maybe you see yourself coming out in the future and that’s just really fucking terrifying. All I can say is that it gets better, it really really does get better.

Words I never thought I’d utter. Well technically I didn’t utter them I thought them, but I suppose writing it down here for the viewing of others could be considered an utterance? Ugh now I’m thinking about cows.

I suppose I’ll say that I never thought that I’d be taking a deeper look into my own social media, and myself asking the question: is this hot enough?

It hadn’t occurred to me that my Instagram account or any social media platform could sway the odds of getting texts from a boy (I really want to quote the Hunger Games here, but notice my restraint) and I’m still not sure it really does but….

Regardless, I’m concerned.

I found evidence of this theory by way of the new Jordan Sparks song “Double Tap” which illustrates the importance of a “hot Instagram”, and her video provides a quick guide on obtaining boyfriends by taking videos of yourself smiling, and then laughing, and then smiling.

Perhaps I could make myself a second Instagram account in which I compile masses of only the best pictures of myself, so boys know that yes my hair does shine like gold whether I’m inside or outside (thanks IG filters) and I can look to the side, or straight! I’m so complex and symmetrical.

In reality I’m not going to do anything at all and I’ll be changing zero things about my Instagram or any other form of social media because trying to impress a guy at the bar that night and then taking a picture and posting it the following morning to keep him impressed makes me feel tired.

And how do I keep that up? Eventually he would see me without makeup right? I’m just assuming, maybe there is actually a way to blind him temporarily each night until you put your foundation on in the morning, maybe like a flashlight that you shine in his eyes and that also deletes his memory, of you shining a flashlight in his eyes.

Anyways back to how this Instagram stuff all came up, I met a boy at a club, we exchanged numbers, talked the next day, he asked what my Instagram account was, I told him, and then,

radio silence.

Suddenly he has a car problem now and ends his text with “maybe next time”

Message received my friend.

I guess pictures of my breakfast, cats, books, and that one where I’m in the back of that car in a beanie just didn’t do it for him. Ugh why didn’t I post more pictures of dogs, ALL IS LOST

Luckily I have a delicious breakfast plus the Instagram feeds of many cat lovers to catch up on and you know that Jordan Sparks song is actually quite catchy, try watching the video too maybe, but don’t video yourself doing the smiling, laughing and than smiling again because that’s hers.

I apparently have a pattern, in that in my hope to break my almost two year non voluntary sabbatical from dating, I actually went on the same date I did almost two years ago.

On my 2015 date last week, I learned pretty much right away that much like my 2013 date, he grew up on the east coast and was in a specific branch of the military.

What are the odds of this? oh are the odds high? What about the evens?

P.S. 2015 date I met on the same dating site I’ve been using as of late. You’d think the profile would have tipped me off that I was going on the same date but sometimes I get very caught up in the detailed descriptions of how much they love their dog.

Ok so anyways here is how my 2015 and 2013 date matched up:

– grew up on east coast
– not super great childhoods
– did some college
– enlisted in early 20’s
– went into air force
– traveled a lot
– ready to settle down now

Naturally the dates both fell into similar rhythms. The hug with both of them in the beginning is always missed, or goes terribly wrong.

Also both of them are meeting up with me for a date around the time that a close sibling of theirs is getting married or about to be married. Panic much?

Both enjoy telling a few very long stories. 2015 tells me about the longest road trip he has ever been on in agonizing detail but then leaves out a few parts and says he wants to spare me the little details. Well what have you been sharing over the last 15 minutes, the medium sized ones? 2013 had given me a similar in time length story about his schooling growing up (I didn’t get that one either) but said nothing about sparing me details, ugh.

As I realized that I was on the same date as the 2013 one I also realized that I was on a date with my sisters husband.

It hit me when I was making my mental checklist of all the things similar about my 2013 date to this one (and nodding a lot while 2015 told me about how he thought he was going to run out of gas this one time on the road trip, spoilers: he didn’t) that that same checklist could be applied to my sisters husband.

My sisters husband Jake, who also grew up on the east coast actually neighbored the states in which 2013 and 2015 lived, and Jake also moved enlisted, and then after traveling decided he wanted to settle down – hence marriage and now on baby #2 with my sister.

I texted my sister to tell her that my last two dates in two years have been with military guys who grew up on the east coast and my sister sent me back an “lol” and then proceeded texting me a story about how when my nephew touches her face he says “no” and she thinks he is saying “nose” but he is pointing at her mouth. Kill me softly, do you not see I’m dating versions of that kids dad?

I guess I shouldn’t say dating because technically 2013 guy got on a plane and went back to the east coast (I blogged about him during this time but have no idea what I had named him..Wedding guy maybe? I’m too lazy to look) maybe an hour after our date, and 2015 said he did want to hang out again and that we would “sort it out” but I haven’t heard from him in several days so maybe he is sorting out his plane ticket also, I hear the east coast is a popular place to run away from first dates!

Don’t be sad for me because I have a new crush! A customer crush! A guy who wears black v-necks and whose dream is to be in a rock band and who probably wouldn’t touch the military if you paid him, unless he was in a military rock band.

He gets his coffee black and his name is Hudson and he asked me if I had a brother the other day so things are totally starting, you know? Wish me luck!

If 2014 had a hand, I would shake it. Probably too enthusiastically, while misty eyed with gratitude.

2014 would probably try to pretend they had an errand to run or an appointment they had to get to, to rid themselves of the outpouring of all my affection, but I can’t help myself. 2014 I love you!

It won’t make sense to you I’m sure, I had not one date for the whole year. Not ONE. What?

But seriously, who gives a fuck? This year has been sensational. Yes I lived with my parents and than a stripper but now I live with my best friends and no strippers!

A handful of weeks before 2014 was over, the nonprofit I’ve been working part-time for asked me to go full time with them. I have loved the work I’ve been doing with them for the past year and I think the contentment I felt with being a part of their team has overridden some of the more negative things of this year, like moving out my belongings at night while my stripper roommate was out, well stripping.

In 2014 I discovered I was an infp through the myers-briggs personality test and then through learning about my infp-ness I have found all my crazy and misunderstood, understood!I no longer blame myself for not thinking the way others do, especially when it comes to romance. I also readily accept that I oftentimes prefer the pretend relationships that go on in my head over the real ones – is that zero date thing making more sense now?

Thinking back on everything though, it blows my mind how that terrible job I took in 2013 that moved me back here led me to my current job. It blows my mind that it took living with a stripper to force me to move in with one of my best friends and my ex, and now I couldn’t imagine anything I wanted more. Well besides a cat, I really want a cat.

2014 just makes me feel lucky. Like I’m the prettiest girl in the ballroom and Mr. Darcy noticed me lucky.

The last date I was on was that guy from the wedding, do you remember? He lives on the east coast now. He made the decision to go there minutes after our date ended. He was on a plane by that evening. I hear he has a beard now.

I want to tell 2014 again how much I love them but I fear they are going to begin blocking my calls. I have enjoyed our time spent together and I just hope they know that.

1. Pick out a straight and unattached male coworker (if you are a straight female) who is perpetually single.

2. Start out shy and slightly untrusting around your SMC (Single Male Coworker) so he has to work a little harder at getting to know you.

3. Ask for him to get you things occasionally and then thank him ever so sweetly, so he knows you have a less standoffish side.

4. Slowly began teasing him so he knows you’re clever and enjoy witty banter.

5. Banter with him a LOT.

6. Do NOT talk about the fact that you don’t have a boyfriend but do mention to a female coworker in front of your SMC that a passing male stranger is attractive. This allows jealousy to stir naturally.

7.Allow your SMC to tell you about his female crushes/random dates but do not get overly excited for him. You want to be a confidant but not a bro.

8. Do occasional thoughtful things for your SMC but then make sure to get embarrassed or shy if he brings attention to them or thanks you.

9. If your SMC takes a joke too far at your expense make sure to appear wounded and or hurt and then pretend to try to act normal. He will see through your pretending not to be hurt but he won’t see that you were pretending to be hurt to begin with. He will feel bad and want to make it up to you and this will also ensure that he knows you have a vulnerable side.

10. Get sloppy drunk at some kind of work event and plant a kiss on his cheek. This simple act that is never spoken of again will keep some hope a glow on his side that despite your attempts to keep him at a distance, you’re slowly letting your guard down.

11. Begin to laugh and smile more in his presence. He is breaking through your icy exterior!

12. Share a little more about your family and tell him when a friend hurts your feelings but continue to restrict social media so he doesn’t have unlimited access to you.

13. Implement physical touch with your SMC before and after he goes on a trip. There should already be some sexual tension by this point so make sure the contact affirms it.

14. Begin to compliment your SMC’s outfits, trendy new haircuts, and eye-wear to establish that you are noticing more things about him. Do not be concerned when these compliments aren’t reciprocated.

15. Tease him about liking a female coworker that the two of you work with until he cracks and blurts out something to the effect of “SHE is not the one I like!” and then let him text you that it’s you later on that night.

16. Continue to wait for him to crack about liking you and not the other coworker. Make sure to convince yourself that his silences are due to him being too afraid to say he likes you and not because he is getting pretty annoyed at being repeatedly teased about the other coworker over and over.

17. Begin to drunk text him occasionally. Make sure the texts are mostly stupid and sometimes unintelligible so he has no clue how to respond.

18. Over react about your SMC’s failure to respond to your drunk texts. Bring up the texts with him at work and learn that he had forgotten you had texted him. Hear all about his date with a girl he met on Tinder.

19. Desperately try to initiate more physical touch. Come up with reasons the two of you should hug like you haven’t seen him for a day and a half and or he gets something off the top shelf for you.

20. Yearn obviously for his attention even when other coworkers are present. Witness their embarrassed looks thrown in your direction, you’ve lost your mind now there is no going back.

21. Send your SMC a text and then when he answers don’t respond back. Keep up the silence until the two of you are back at work. Manage to slip into conversation that you didn’t even read his answer to your question the other day. Your nonchalance and indifference must be killing him which is why he keeps talking about this tinder date to make you jealous.

22. Spend and extra thirty minutes Christmas shopping as you try to pick out a small gift for him. Something that symbolizes everything and nothing at the same time.

23. Stalk his social media but refuse to follow him. Look for clues that he is falling in love with you.

24. Lie awake at night using verses of different Top 40 songs to depict the complexity of your relationship with your SMC. Fall back on the Heart Wants What It Wants by Selena Gomez if your SMC seemed especially un-talkative that day, or brings up having the tinder girl over to meet his parents.

25. Wear an extra short skirt to work one day, but then a more tomboy outfit the next, to show that you’re super hot but also cool. Wear the short skirt and a tomboy look on top to prove that you’re sexy but not even trying.

26. Ignore warning signs that you’ve begun to self destruct.

27. Color your hair lighter because he prefers blondes

28. Paint a watercolor picture of the two of you at work together and hang it up above your bed to look at before you go to sleep.

Do not get hung up on the fact that your ex-coworker, who was dating a beautiful blonde girl several months ago, shows up to this friends birthday dinner with now a beautiful blonde boy. Do not think to yourself “Well fine go ahead and take ALL the attractive golden haired people then” as you hug the coworker because she will certainly feel the envy radiating off your body. Try also, to not grimace when the blonde boy speaks up a half hour later and reveals that he and your ex co-worker are already talking about babies.

Don’t be alarmed and look for exits when everybody gets real excited about that blonde beauty’s wanting to have babies throwout by the way. The girl sitting next to your ex-coworker is already pregnant and the girl on the other side of her is hoping to be, and this is basically the equivalent of a pizza place opening up next to a college student apartment complex, it’s basically mass hysteria and chaos. Maybe just know where the exits are.

Do not by any means feel comfortable enough to share with a smaller section of the table down at the end, about your ridiculous and surprisingly emotional reaction to Benedict Cumberbatch’s engagement. Everyone at the other end of the table will conclude talking about all the activities they did over the weekend with their real life partners, just in time to hear that upon receiving the news you slammed shut every door in the house, said “fuck him” audibly, and then actually cried in the car on the way to work. They will not understand how a celebrity’s love life could effect your morning so catastrophically and neither will you.

Do not be thrown by the fact that your recently out Ex told you in the car on the way to this dinner, that he has two Match dates lined up this week with two very good looking men. Don’t ask to see pictures of them before you get to the restaurant because the pictures will affirm that yes these men are hot and that information will only serve to irritate you.

Do not order a beer at dinner when the rest of the table orders water. Do not ask for a second beer before dinner arrives. You will quickly set yourself up as the only single person there and the only single person there who doesn’t have upcoming coffee dates with beautiful men. Scratch what I said, order four beers.

Do not outwardly judge your married friends when they want to buy ANOTHER dog. As if your Instagram feed isn’t plagued with enough pictures of their current dog. Embrace the buying of a second dog because it will stave off the probability of them trying to conceive a child, which would make dinners in which friends can meet up and drink beers at least twice a year, a once every two years affair.

Offer maybe even to watch their dog(s) also, when they are out of town. There is a 90% chance they will ask you anyway due to your penchant to spend nights alone with a bottle of wine, as well as there is a 90% chance they will become hyper focused on showing you exactly what proportions of not-too-cold but not-too-hot water their animal(s) need and will then forget to hide their good liquor in a locked cabinet.

Do not, I repeat, Do NOT be upset when you are not asked questions about how your life is going. This is the highest award you could ever receive, the greatest blessing that could ever be bestowed upon someone single in a group setting, surrounded by couples.

Lastly, do not leave this dinner as quickly as possible with the excuse that you have to wake up before 6am the next day and then really just go home to have three more beers and watch Sleeping Beauty.

I mean who is going to believe you’re waking up before 6? Just say you work early.

I’ve messaged 28 men to no avail, I feel it only fair that I should be now allowed to give up, buy a cat, and rent a studio apartment.

This is my god given right to wave the flag of surrender and devote my life to work and booze. This is the new American-Drunk-Dream that involves extra deposits for my future cat whom I will name Roger, and hernias dedicated to long hours of stress and a side of overtime.

I had downloaded the fatal app that caused me to give up on the world the day after my friends and I all went downtown. As the designated driver I had expected to be the only one who did NOT do something stupid on their phone but as luck would have it, I accidentally began following The Worker Boy on social media.

I realized around 2am that I had done this and then I quickly deleted it and tried to erase any trace of it happening. The next day I began researching dating apps, because one thing I know is that when I’m not looking at Worker Boys social media, I’m texting him, and I just need to be an adult and flirt with someone online who is basically a stranger. I mean, because that’s the only thing that makes sense anymore.

So two weeks later I’ve messaged 28/men/boys/males, and been messaged by four men whom I did NOT message. Two of these four men were over 60 years old, one is hoping I’ll be his first date EVER, and the fourth I can’t really explain except to say that hell hath no fury like flame symbols all over your clothing (copyright issue?).

Two weeks, almost 30 messages sent out, but tell me to ask the cute guy from safeway what he did over the weekend and it’s a no go. He will probably say “work” and then I’ll say “me too” and then where will we be?

Now I didn’t pick the most popular app or anything, it’s called HowAboutWe and it is supposed to encourage people to go out on a date and not chat a shit ton online. It isn’t geared towards getting married, more just having fun, so I felt it was safe to download and hesitantly try.

Most of the time I find myself using it after a glass of wine or a couple of beers, where that “I’m Intrigued” button that messages the other person for you seems easier to press.

But even though scrolling is fun when intoxicated and even though I haven’t texted Worker Boy in awhile, online dating is still dreadful.

All the typical single girl blog posts that talk about how guys take the absolute least flattering pictures of all time is 100% accurate. Sometimes I’ll scroll when drunk and still say wow, these are my options.

The grammar in their profiles is terrible, the shirtless pics have me rolling my eyes, the huge cross tattoos are so “basic” I could cry and don’t even get me started on what they actually post.

“Looking for a girl who is down to chill and likes dogs”

Um yes hi, the name of the game is posting date ideas. The beginning of your post is written for you and it says “How about we…….” and that is when you put in a date idea for someone else to respond to your date idea.

Did you not read the instructions?

As fun as scrolling through terrible pictures and finding a cute one is, online dating is still where I believe romance goes to die.

I refuse to delete it because hell I did pay for it and I still don’t want to text Worker Boy, and hats off to you folks that it works for but I think I’d rather just ask Siri how her day is. She’s fiesty.